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Eric Leonard Named Geological Society of America Fellow

Published on May 13, 2013

Eric Leonard, professor of geology and director of the Southwest Studies program at CC, has been named a Fellow of the Geological Society of America. The fellowship honors high achievements in the field of research and education.

Eric Leonard, professor of geology and director of the Southwest Studies program at CC, has been named a Fellow of the Geological Society of America. The fellowship honors high achievements in the field of research and education.

“It is a great honor to be nominated as a GSA Fellow by my colleagues – former teachers, students, and research collaborators.” Leonard said. “They are the people who made possible my rewarding career in geology.”

Leonard’s areas of specialty include glaciation and climate change in the mountains of the western U.S. and Canada, alpine geomorphology, and recent tectonics and landscape evolution of Colorado and Chile. He has done geologic work and teaching on five continents, and currently is in the final year of an NSF-funded research project studying past climates along the crest of the Rocky Mountains from Montana to New Mexico, a project that has involved eight CC undergraduates.

Leonard earned a B.A. in history from the University of California, Berkley, a M.A. in geography from Simon Fraser University, and a Ph.D. in geological sciences from the University of Colorado, Boulder. He began teaching at CC in 1981 and served for many years as chair of the Geology Department. This past fall he became director of CC’s Southwest Studies program.

Leonard is the third Colorado College Geology Department member to be awarded this honor, joining professors Christine Siddoway and Paul Myrow, both inducted in 2010. Leonard will be recognized at the annual Geological Society of America meeting in Denver in late October.